Naghi [1], I swear on your sense of humor ‎
On this exile who thinks he’s here to criticize [2] ‎
On the large penis that gives life ‎
That sits behind us and threatens us ‎
I swear on the length and width of [Western-imposed] sanctions ‎
On the rising value of the dollar and the feeling of humiliation [3] ‎
Naghi, I swear on the cardboard Imam [Khomeini] [4] ‎
On the baby [Khamenei] who was saying “Ali!” while stuck in his mother’s womb [5] ‎
On the teaching of jurisprudence in the room where nose jobs are given [6] ‎
On Khamenei, the prayer beads and prayer rugs made in China [7] ‎
Naghi, I swear on the finger of Sheys Rezaei [8] ‎
On the religion that has been kicked out and religious soccer [9] ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi [10] ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi [11] ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi ‎
Naghi, I swear on love and Viagra ‎
On raised legs and chakras ‎
On sangak bread [12] and chicken and meat and fish ‎
On silicon chests and striped virginity [13] ‎
Naghi, I swear on Golshifteh’s breasts [14] ‎
On lost prestige that we never had [15] ‎
Naghi, I swear on Aryan heritage [16] ‎
On the necklace that you wear around your neck [17] ‎
Naghi, [I give] my life for Farnood’s penis [18] ‎
For the 3 billion dollars, soon forgotten like a children’s story [19] ‎
And the Persian Gulf and [Lake] Orumiyeh, too [20] ‎
Oh by the way, what was the name of the leader of the Green Movement? [21] ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, O Naghi, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, O Naghi, O Naghi ‎
On the anniversary of the death of that old fart, Imam of the [Shi’ah] community [22] ‎
On the fossilized opposition in the diaspora [23] ‎
On the classy widows who frequent discos ‎
On the intellectual discussions in chat rooms ‎
On the dissolute men with a false sense of honor [24] ‎
On the women who defend men’s rights [25] ‎
On the color revolution in the television [26] ‎
On the 3% of the [Iranian] population who read books [27] ‎
On the wishy-washy, empty slogans [28] ‎
Naghi, I swear on this crowd of fickle people ‎
Who in the morning say “Long live…!” but at night say “Death to…!” [29] ‎
On the heroes of fictional stories ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, now that the Hidden Imam is asleep, we call upon you, O Naghi ‎
Appear, for we are ready in our burial shrouds, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, O Naghi, O Naghi ‎
O Naghi, O Naghi, O Naghi ‎
Ohhhhhhhhhh Naghi ‎

[1] Ali al-Hadi, also known as Ali an-Naghi, was the 10th of the Twelve Imams ‎of Shi’ah Islam. According to the Shi’ah tradition, Imam Naghi was the grandfather of the Hidden ‎Imam (see note 10 for more info on this). ‎

[2] There is an Iranian phrase, lengesh kon, which is used to label armchair criticism. The phrase ‎essentially means, “Come on, bring him down already!” and the expression has its roots in ‎wrestling. It refers to a specific move where a wrestler grabs the opponent’s thigh to drop him to the ‎floor/wrestling mat. The phrase that Najafi uses in the original is “biroon az gowd,” which literally ‎means “outside the [wrestling] ring/arena,” typically found in “houses of strength” (zur-khānehs, ‎traditional Persian gymnasiums) and is a metaphorical reference to members of the Iranian diaspora ‎who criticize Iranians living inside Iran for not persisting in their protests against their government. ‎With this remark, Najafi is casting a spotlight on Iranian armchair critics and is calling them out on ‎their cowardice. The Encyclopedia Iranica has an in-depth article on zur-khānehs ‎‎here ‎

[3] Inside Iran, the value of the dollar has appreciated at a phenomenal rate while their own ‎currency (rials and tomans) has plummeted to the verge of worthlessness. Indeed, many Iranians ‎talk about how when it comes to luxury items (e.g. high-class cars), the vendors will only accept ‎payment in the form of dollars and will refuse to transact using Iranian currency on account of its ‎spiraling depreciation. ‎

[4] This is a reference to the celebration of the 33rd anniversary of Khomeini’s arrival in Iran, ‎which signaled an end to 2,500 years of Persian monarchy and the inauguration of a theocratic ‎government. On this particular anniversary, the Iranian government sponsored a reenactment of the ‎historic moment where Khomeini disembarked from an Air France plane and arrived in Tehran. The ‎star of this reenactment was a cardboard cutout of Khomeini. The event was ridiculed and mocked ‎by all sorts of press. David Goodman wrote a piece covering the reenactment and the reaction ‎towards it on the New York Times ‎

[5] This is a reference to a remark made by the Friday prayer leader of Qom (Ayatollah Muhammad ‎Sa’idi) last year, where after recounting an historical Shi’ah narrative, he claims that Ali ‎Khamenei—the Supreme Leader of Iran—came out of his mother’s womb saying, “Ya Ali!” (“O ‎Ali!”). Ali was the cousin and son-in-law of Muhammad, and Shi’ah Muslims consider him to be ‎the first of the Twelve Imams and the rightful successor to Muhammad. The video of Ayatollah ‎Sa’idi’s sermon can be viewed online here ‎

[6] This is a quip about the ubiquity of nose jobs in Iran. In fact, many people say that Iran leads the ‎world in nose job per capita. My take on this verse is that Najafi is juxtaposing the phenomenon of ‎nose jobs in Iran—which women get so frequently because they’re forced to cover everything else, ‎and the nose thus remains their most prominent feature—with the clerics’ desire to instill religious ‎faith and fervor through jurisprudence classes. I think Najafi is ultimately trying to say that Iranian ‎youth don’t care about Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh), and are instead more concerned with perfecting ‎the parts of their bodies which government-imposed religion has, for now, left untouched. ‎Essentially, it’s a message of rebellion against force-fed religion. ‎

[7] This remark underscores the fact that Iran is importing a huge amount of their commodities from ‎China—even down to the religious items, like prayer beads and rugs. ‎

[8] Sheys Rezaei is an Iranian soccer player who was banned from the Persepolis team for slapping ‎the buttocks of his teammate, Persepolis defender Mohammad Nosrati, and fingering his anus ‎during a goal-scoring celebration against the Damash Gilan team. The Iranian government ‎denounced this as an “immoral act,” and he did not return to the team until early 2012. The BBC ‎covered this incident here: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-15533927 And there is a ‎video here ‎

[9] Here, Najafi is both ascribing a general indifference towards religion to the people of Iran while ‎also acknowledging that the sport of soccer itself has become a totally government-owned and ‎regulated activity (hence the mixing of religion, an integral part of the Iranian government, with ‎soccer). ‎

[10] The Hidden Imam (also known as the Twelfth Imam or Mahdi) is the central figure of Islamic ‎eschatology and is the equivalent of the second coming of Christ in Christian eschatology. ‎According to the Shi’ah narrative, the Hidden Imam was born in 869 CE and went into occultation ‎in 874 at only 5 years of age, when he assumed the Imamate. When he returns, it is believed that he ‎will bring justice and peace by establishing Islam throughout the world. ‎

[11] Muslims typically wrap the dead in burial shrouds—usually made of white cotton or linen—‎before depositing them in their graves. It’s a satire against the religious zealots who boast that they ‎are ready to die for a cause that they often don’t even understand. ‎

[12] “Nan-e Sangak” is an Iranian kind of whole wheat, sourdough flatbread that is baked in an ‎oven on a bed of hot tiny river stones. The word “sangak” means “little stone” or “pebble,” and ‎these would cling to the bread due to the nature of the baking process. ‎‎This is a picture of sangak bread ‎

[13] I’m not entirely sure what Najafi means here by striped virginity, but I do have two theories: ‎
‎(A) The first theory pertains to the belief that exists among some ultraconservative Iranians which ‎states that a woman will go to heaven if she dies a virgin (if I am wrong about this and the details ‎that follow, someone please correct me). These super-traditional Iranians (usually prison guards) try ‎to prevent this from happening by raping the convicted women so that they will be “guilty” of ‎adultery, and will not go to heaven as a result. Obviously, this is just a pretext for having sex. ‎Placed in this context, the idea of “striped virginity” conjures up the image of a girl, clad in a ‎typically striped prison uniform, who is about to lose the only thing keeping her alive in the eyes of ‎the Iranian government: her virginity. Hence, a link is established between “stripes”, AKA the girl’s ‎prison uniform, and her virginity. ‎
‎(B) The second theory, which is actually not mine but a friend’s, considers the “striped virginity” to ‎be a girl’s hymen—which of course, when penetrated, marks the loss of her virginity. Taken in this ‎light, perhaps Najafi’s remark is some kind of allusion to hymenorrhaphy—a surgical procedure ‎whereby a girl’s hymen is surgically restored. This reconstruction of an “artificial virginity” would ‎at the very least be related to the theme of artificiality inherent in this particular verse, since Najafi ‎also mentions a chest of silicon, which to most women is the apex of superficiality. However, I have ‎no idea where the “striped” part of the verse would come into play when considering this theory. ‎

[14] This is a reference to the Iranian actress Golshifteh Farahani, who posed nude for the French ‎magazine Madame Le Figaro at the beginning of 2012. Upon discovering this, the Iranian ‎government sent her a communication telling her that she would not be allowed to return to Iran. ‎Farahani’s nude photograph was the subject of much controversy among Iranians for several weeks. ‎The Telegraph covered this incident ‎‎here ‎

[15] This is a quip about the status of aberoo —which could mean honor, prestige, or saving face—‎in Iranian society. Najafi is criticizing people who never really had prestige or honor, even though ‎they thought they did. ‎

[16] Iranians believe that they are descendants of the Aryans (nejād-e ārīyā’ī) and many of them ‎take great pride in what they believe to be a heritage replete with heroism and magnanimous kings ‎‎(e.g. Cyrus the Great and his freedom of the Jews from Babylon; his “Cyrus Cylinder,” believed by ‎some to be the first charter of human rights; etc.). ‎

[17] Based on the patriotic context of the previous line, I believe that this is a reference to the pelāk-‎e Farvahar, which is a necklace that sports the ancient Zoroastrian icon of the Farvahar. It is ‎typically worn by Iranians who are proud of their heritage. More on the Farvahar at ‎‎Wikipedia‎

[18] This is a reference to an incident that occurred on an Iranian children’s television show last ‎year, when the hostess of the program asked the “audience”—composed entirely of kindergarteners, ‎and perhaps even younger—what sorts of activities they could perform on their own without any ‎help from others. One of the boys, who identifies himself only as Farnood (and was later dubbed ‎‎“Farnood-e Rāstgoo,” or “Farnood the Truthful,” by some Iranians), answers the question by ‎innocently stating that he goes to the bathroom and washes his penis all by himself. At first, the ‎hostess didn’t catch what Farnood said; but as soon as it hits her, she rejects his response on the air ‎by saying “No no no, that’s not right!” Many Iranians considered this an issue of censorship against ‎an innocent child who, as far as they were concerned, had no lewd or provocative intent in his ‎response and was merely answering the hostess’s question. There is a video of this incident ‎‎here‎

[19] I am fairly sure that this is a reference to Amir Mansour Khosravi (also known as Mahafarid ‎Amir Khosravi or Amir Mansour Aria), the former finance minister of Iranian President Mahmoud ‎Ahmadinejad, whom the Iranian parliament found guilty of embezzling $2.6 billion last year. This ‎incident is believed to be the biggest banking fraud in Iran’s history. ‎‎Here is one report on the fraud: ‎

The reference to a “children’s story” comes from the fact that this verse, translated literally, says “3 ‎billion [dollars] under the blue dome.” The blue dome refers to the sky, and is a reference to the ‎Persian phrase yeki bood yeki nabood, zir-e gonbad-e kabood which is essentially the equivalent of ‎‎“once upon a time” (lit. There once was, there once was not, under the blue dome/sky). This phrase ‎is a preface to all common children’s stories written in Persian. Thus, Najafi is comparing the ‎banking fraud to a children’s story, as if to say that despite the gravity of this incident, people were ‎invited by Khamenei to “forget about it” and “not to prolong or dwell on the discussion publicly.” ‎

[20] In the same vein as the previous reference, he is criticizing the Iranian tendency to blow up ‎‎“natonalistic causes,” such as the labeling of their nearby gulf as the Persian Gulf vs. the Arabian ‎Gulf, and the drying up of Lake Orumiyeh, which is vital to economy of the city of Orumiyeh and ‎surrounding cities. ‎

[21] Similar in nature to the previous two lines. Najafi is indicating that people have forgotten about ‎the Green Movement to the extent where they can’t remember the name of its leader (implying Mir ‎Hossein Mousavi?): ‎‎2009–2010 Iranian ‎election protests ‎

[22] This is a reference to a faux pas made by an Iranian television host on the air in 2009, when ‎instead of describing the death of Imam Khomeini as heart-rendering (jān-sooz), he accidentally ‎said “heart fart” (jān-gooz). There is a ‎video of this incident on YouTube ‎

[23] I think this is a reference to older Iranian politicians in the diaspora who have been ‎unsuccessfully fighting the Islamic Republic for over 30 years. ‎

[24] This is an attack on Iranian men who believe themselves to have a sense of honor (when it ‎comes to defending the honor of their wife, girlfriend, sister, or mother), while at the same time ‎they engage in dishonorable acts, such as cavorting with prostitutes. ‎

[25] I believe this is a reference to a particular episode of an Iranian talk show, when the guest was ‎an ultraconservative Muslim woman who was advocating the religiously-sanctioned subjugation of ‎women in comparison to the “station” of their husbands, and was ultimately defending men’s rights ‎to whatever the Qur’an supposedly entitled them when it comes to marriage. However, I only ‎vaguely remember seeing this and can’t find it on YouTube. If anyone knows what I’m talking ‎about—or if I’m way off base here—please contribute! ‎

[26] This might be Najafi musing on how some revolutions in the past have adopted colors as an ‎essential characteristic (i.e. “color revolutions”). Obviously, there is green with the Iranian Green ‎Movement, but there was also the Shah’s White Revolution, the Purple Revolution in Iraq, the Rose ‎Revolution in Georgia, and the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, to name a few. More information ‎about color revolutions is available on Wikipedia‎

[27] It looks like Najafi is attacking a general disinclination to reading books among Iranians. ‎Iranians have, as a whole, lost interest in reading books because their government has censored and ‎banned the majority of worthwhile literature. ‎

[28] I think Najafi is criticizing the litany of anti-regime slogans that Iranian protesters have devised ‎over the years, which—although clever—really didn’t do a whole lot for their cause in the end. The ‎word he uses to describe the slogans, ābakī, literally means “watery,” by which he probably intends ‎to convey the slogans as ineffective rallying cries that are devoid of any real power. ‎

[29] This is probably a reference to protesters during the premiership of Mohammad Mossadegh, ‎when one group would often pour into the streets shouting “Long live Mossadegh!” in the morning, ‎whereas in the evenings (or afternoons) another group would shout “Death to Mossadegh, long live ‎the Shah!” With this remark, Najafi is classifying Iranian protestors in general as nothing more than ‎mere bandwagoners with a whimsical sense of loyalty that is as flimsy as the wind.

Sattar Beheshti died sometime in the last few days. I never met him in person. What I know of him ‎from the times we talked over the phone was that he was a simple young man, a hard worker, a son ‎to a mother to whom he was devoted. I also know that he loved his country. ‎
By all accounts Sattar was brutally tortured to death. Word has been trickling out from Iran, and ‎apparently other political prisoners saw him in the week he was in Evin Prison. They said he was ‎badly beaten, that barely a square inch of his body was untouched by the monsters who interrogated ‎him. ‎
Sattar was arrested by the government thugs who investigate any online activity on Facebook and ‎Twitter that they deem to be against the Islamic Republic of Iran. ‎
What is curious is how quickly they killed Sattar. He was only arrested on October 30, 2012, and by ‎November 6, his mother received a call to buy a plot in which to bury her son. I have to wonder if ‎he had been more famous if they might not have been so fast to end his life. Was he someone the ‎‎“cyber police” were using as an example to warn other young people against sending Tweets and ‎Facebook postings? Did he hold out on giving them the information they were seeking to the point ‎that his torturers lost control? ‎
We’ll never know the answers to these questions. ‎
What we know is that Sattar’s love of country made him a target. We know that he was brave and ‎raised his voice in protest. In one of our conversations I cautioned him to take care, and Sattar ‎responded that he saw the faces of the people in his country, how difficult their lives were and how ‎poor they were, and that he couldn’t be quiet as long as they suffered. ‎
Sattar’s life is just one more that has been cut short by a regime that places no value on human life. ‎Unlike any of the current events in the Middle East that get airtime from international media outlets, ‎Sattar’s death will be a blip that a few of us will write and talk about. He didn’t die out in the streets ‎where the world would see, but instead Sattar died in the shadows where cowards kill innocent ‎people behind closed doors. ‎
For those of us who knew Sattar, as the disbelief subsides, we are left angry. How long will we ‎watch this regime take the lives of our young people? How long will we wait? When will they pay ‎for the lives of the innocent brothers and sisters of our country that they have taken? ‎
They will remain until we unite. Sattar knew this. He didn’t live to see it, but he understood that ‎once we join together against the evil that has controlled out country since 1979, we will see its ‎end. Until then, we will remember Sattar…his face etched in our mind just as the faces of Neda, ‎Sohrab, Akbar, and the thousands of others are.